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November 2, 2010

Award-winning Biographer to Discuss Patrick Henry

Acclaimed author Harlow Giles Unger will discuss the life and times of Patrick Henry, the instrumental but frequently overlooked patriot, at 5:30 p.m. on Nov. 9 at the DeWitt Wallace Decorative Arts Museum in the Hennage Auditorium. Unger’s seventh and most recent book, “Lion of Liberty: Patrick Henry and the Call to a New Nation,” concerns the mercurial founding father, whose importance rivals that of George Washington himself.

The program will be followed by a book signing, and copies will be available for purchase.

Henry is the origin of many American themes that continue to this day. A true renaissance man who was an accomplished orator, lawyer and humorist, Henry was the first to call patriots to arms against Britain, the first to insist on a bill of rights, and the first to protest a powerful federal government. Many of his ideas concerning coercive taxation and undeclared wars seem eerily pertinent today.

Admission is included with all Historic Area or museum passes.

Programs at the DeWitt Wallace Decorative Arts Museum are supported by the DeWitt Wallace Endowment Fund.

The Art Museums of Colonial Williamsburg include the Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Folk Art Museum and the DeWitt Wallace Decorative Arts Museum. The Abby Aldrich Rockefeller Folk Art Museum is home to the nation’s premier collection of American folk art, with more than 5,000 folk art objects made during the 18th, 19th and 20th centuries. The DeWitt Wallace Decorative Arts Museum exhibits the best in British and American decorative arts from 1670–1830.

The Art Museums of Colonial Williamsburg are located at the intersection of Francis and South Henry Streets in Williamsburg, Va., and are entered through the Public Hospital of 1773. Museum hours are 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. daily. For museum program information, telephone (757) 220-7724.

The Colonial Williamsburg Foundation is the not-for-profit educational and cultural organization that preserves and operates the restored 18th-century Revolutionary capital of Virginia as a town-sized living history museum, telling the inspirational stories of our nation’s founding men and women. Williamsburg is located in Virginia’s Tidewater region, 20 minutes from Newport News, within an hour’s drive of Richmond and Norfolk, and 150 miles south of Washington, D.C., off Interstate 64. For more information about Colonial Williamsburg, call 1-800-HISTORY or visit Colonial Williamsburg’s website at www.history.org.